


Quest For Fire And Ice Cream

by Keenir



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Children of Characters, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:54:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21875488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keenir/pseuds/Keenir
Relationships: Loki/Sif (Marvel)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 9
Collections: Mischief and Mistletoe 2019





	Quest For Fire And Ice Cream

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thewritingwanderer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewritingwanderer/gifts).



**PRESENT DAY:**

“The lovely and stalwart Princess Ashes rode her mighty coconut horse Nth the Ninth through the countryside, waving prettily as her loyalists threw accolades and praise at her. All who beheld her agreed that the princess was the noblest of the noblest nobles, so pretty was she that –“

“That out from behind a castle rock stepped the great goddess Hela, who sought the Princess’ secrets of beauty and coolness!” loudly hissed Hela as she stepped into Ashes’ path. “For the glory of the waving multitudes, fight me to the death!”

Ashes looked down at her hands, which were holding the twigs she was using in place of coconuts and coconut horses, and then back up at Hela. “I would love to, but could we hug instead?”

Hela lowered her own twig, letting it drop harmlessly. “I would accept that as a superior outcome for both sides,” and held out her arms.

While Ashes was hugging back, she told Hela, “You’re so much fun, Aunty.”

“Thank you, Niece.” Though, after a bit, a thought occurred to her: “Question,” Hela said.

“Yes?”

“I thought I heard a coconut horse.”

“I asked for one,” Ashes said, “but Mommy’s Midgardians keep coming up with polite fictions why they can’t let me have one.”

“How dare they!” Hela said.

**< hr>FLASHBACK**

Snow and fog swirled around her as the woollybeast brayed and boomed its protests at Sif trying to regain control and make it resume its ground-eating trot through this cavernous great hall. _Trust her to have built a grander structure than the one she enjoyed back in Asgard._ "Hela! You know me, it is I, Sif from the line of Hymir. Where are you, and I need to ask you -"

"Ask?" Hela's voice resonated pleasantly in the chamber. "What have you come to ask me, you who were once loyal?"

"I have come in pursuit of Prince Loki. Please, help me find him!"

The snow stopped falling, and the winds settled. As the fog danced about her, "A curious wording, Sif the ever-careful."

 _For hels sake, Hela, stop playing._ "Do you know where he is or not?" Sif challenged her. "You never liked anyone wasting your time - so do me the same kindness."

"Gladly," and the fog dissipated, the night came to an end, and the walls produced a dim glow - dim but everpresent enough for there to be no question of what was being seen.

The end of the room was far closer than Sif had thought - the woollybeast had been in the right after all. Sif dismounted, still holding the reins for a swift escape with Loki.

At the room's end, Hela sat upon her throne.

Loki stood by her side.

_The good news is Hela doesn't have Lorelei's mastery over men. The bad news is she doesn't need it._

Hela said to her, "Your pursuit can end - you have found the questing beast you desire." To Loki, "It happened rarely, but it was always fun to see her turn that color."

"Sif?" Loki asked.

"Don't fret, brother," Hela advised him. "For me, she was pure loyalty. For you, I suspect loyalty is not all she has for you. Aand she's turning that color again," with a teasing grin at Sif.

"Is this true?" Loki asked softly after walking up to Sif.

Sif said, "I...had planned to tell you. When the time was right. _She_ did not factor into it."

Hela interjected with "Speaking of, how are your fellow co-conspirators?"

 _"Counter_ -conspirators," Sif corrected her. "Amora is enjoying a long vacation. Lorelei is in prison."

"Interesting. And you, good brother? How are you faring?"

"I had thought I was well enough," Loki said. "Til m- our father collapsed, and I found I was unwanted."

"Loki, that _is not_ true!" Sif stated, looking deep into his eyes thanks to bodily proximity. "That has _never been_ true!"

"Is it not? I was bid to sit upon the Throne - a request from Frigga, Queen of Asgard. And you were there to...not welcome me to that temporary position."

 _In fairness, we could have taken you for a celebratory drink before we started asking about Thor._ "We had a request," Sif said.

Hela, impressed, said, "It must have been quite the considerable request, for my brother to be sent a-viking, a-wandering all the way to my kingdom."

"We may have framed it less as a petitioning, and more as -"

"Truly, some things _never_ change," Hela laughed. Calmly, "May I assist breaking this puzzle, brother?"

"They wanted me to bring our brother Thor from his banishment, despite I have no way of restoring his powers."

"Father's idea? 'Earn your powers' and gain responsibility?"

Loki nodded.

"I can help. Send me to the world he is on."

"Except," Sif said, placing herself between Loki and Hela, "you are bound to this place. This is your imprisonment."

"True," Hela smiled. "And while Odin alone can end that banishment, any of Odin's family may send me on temporary quests to other realms - myself excluded, naturally."

Looking not at the woman he had always secretly loved, nor at the sister he had never known of, Loki looked at his arm. "You will work what will bring Thor back, and then yourself return?"

"Of course. Like our father, I am my word."

"Loki..." Sif urged.

In favor of or asking against it, now? "Go," he said to his sister.

**< HR>PRESENT DAY, THE PRIOR EVENING:**

“Is that really how Daddy met Aunty?”

“It is,” Frigga said as she tucked this granddaughter into bed. _Your Aunty may have initially planned to use subterfuge and division to set us at one anothers' throats, or the chance to rejoin the family may have been one she genuinely embraced - or both; I long suspected both._ “Did you think it happened another way?” as she sat on the side of the girl’s bed.

An eager nod. “With fire and armies and blood.”

“We were all surprised by the absence of those, to be sure.”

“But then, Daddy can talk anyone into anything.”

Frigga smiled. “He has always been good at that.”

“Grandmother?” a note of wariness in that little voice.

“Yes?”

“When you die, can I be queen of the Nine Realms?”

Kissing her forehead, “I think your reign will be magnificent, Queen Ashes.”

“Thank you, Grandmother,” Ashes said, hugging her stuffed firebear.

“You’re quite welcome, Granddaughter. Now, do you have any other questions, or are you really ready for sleep this time?”

“When its time for Firenight, can I light the flame this year?”

“That, I am certain, is a matter you should discuss with your parents.”

“But you outrank them! You can tell them what to do!”

“I do, yes; but it is not my place to give you an advantage over your siblings.”

Ashes made a face. Then cleared it away and smiled. “Thank you, Grandmother, and goodnight.”

“Goodnight,” Frigga said.

**< hr>NEXT MORNING:**

“Lines up,” Sif instructed Ullr, suspecting that this ‘talc’ substance was an evil Midgardian plot to render Asgardians short of breath. Certainly Ullr was doing his part in the plot, clapping the powder everywhere.

“Ma-ma?” Ullr asked with all the wide-eyed innocence he could muster.

“Cuteness will not avail you on this battlefield, my son. Remove your lines from your diaper so I can finish cleaning you.”

“O-kay-day.”

When I find out which of Hope’s men-at-arms taught him that… I wager it was Tony or Obadiah; they do prefer cooing over Ullr’s genius.

“Is it safe?” Loki asked, peering around the edge of the open door.

And their little girl Smoke seconded the question: “Safe now, right?”

Refusing to sigh and thus inhale the airborne powder, Sif asked, “Can you ask your son to pick up his lines?”

“Can you tell me why he is my son when he is in trouble, but our son when we are proud?”

“For the same reason the girls are your daughters when they find trouble, but our daughters when we are proud of them.”

I didn’t give birth to Ullr, though. Still… “Come here, my son,” Loki said to Ullr, letting his lines show, and used them to help Ullr pull his own lines back up his legs. “There, problem solved.”

“All gone,” Ullr said, looking down where a diaper used to be. And then there was a new diaper. “Now clean – ma-ma a magician!”

“Yes, now say that where Amora and that Strange fellow can hear you,” Sif giggled to herself.

“Okay.”

“Um…maybe a secret for now?” Loki asked him.

“Okay, I keep it secret, keep it safe.”

Loki and Sif looked at each other and knew who’d taught him that one: “Darcy.”

“Can I take Ullr off your hands?” Smoke asked. “I’d like to play with him again.”

“If you promise you won’t use your brother as a target,” Loki asked her.

“I promise.”

“And you promise not to throw your brother at targets.”

“Drop-kick?”

“No.”

“Can we play Zoo?”

“Not after you nearly got eaten,” Sif said.

“I wanted to show Ullr I’m not afraid of how friendly hippos are.”

Loki crouched down to Smoke’s eye level. “You should never be afraid to be afraid. I was, and it nearly brought me to ruin.”

“You?”

“I.”

“But you’re Loki the Great And Magnificent.”

Smoke’s parents’ eyes grew very wide and they looked at each other before one of them asked her, “Where did you hear that?”

“Uhhhh…sarcasm…Uncle Thor’s company picnic.”

Both Sif and Loki breathed a sigh of relief. Lay it at the feet of those Avengers Hope commands.

And then the four of them were moved by the bifrost.

**MEANWHILE:**

“The lovely and stalwart Princess Ashes rode her mighty coconut horse Nth the Ninth through the countryside, waving prettily as her loyalists threw accolades and praise at her. All who beheld her agreed that the princess was the noblest of the noblest nobles, so pretty was she that –“

“That out from behind a castle rock stepped the great goddess Hela, who sought the Princess’ secrets of beauty and coolness!” loudly hissed Hela as she stepped into Ashes’ path. “For the glory of the waving multitudes, fight me to the death!”

Ashes looked down at her hands, which were holding the twigs she was using in place of coconuts and coconut horses, and then back up at Hela. “I would love to, but could we hug instead?”

Hela lowered her own twig, letting it drop harmlessly. “I would accept that as a superior outcome for both sides,” and held out her arms.

While Ashes was hugging back, she told Hela, “You’re so much fun, Aunty.”

“Thank you, Niece.” Though, after a bit, a thought occurred to her: “Question,” Hela said.

“Yes?”

“I thought I heard a coconut horse.”

“I asked for one,” Ashes said, “but Mommy’s Midgardians keep coming up with polite fictions why they can’t let me have one.”

“How dare they!” Hela said.

“Aunt Hela?”

“Yes, Ashes?”

“Before I asked if you would play with me, were you having an Angry Time?”

“I was upset, but I am not yet angry,” Hela said.

“I’m glad,” and her stick arms redoubled their hugging efforts.

Even having been hugged all her niece’s life, this was still new for Hela. She waited til this latest hug was complete, then knelt – to the only one she knelt to – “What do you do when you are angry?” well knowing the answer after all this time; still, ritual.

Silly Aunty, you know! “All-you-can-eat ice cream on Midgard!”

“Then away with us to there!”

“Aunty, Mommy and Daddy’s friends like us to say when we’re coming a-visiting.”

‘wait for permission’ in other words, a fact that had never gone over well with her. “Hope will understand. This is ice cream we speak of.”

And with that, Sif and Loki and Ullr and Smoke were abruptly bifrosted to stand in front of Ashes and Aunty Hela.

“Isn’t it too early in the morning for plotting?” Loki asked his daughter.

“Is it ever too early?”

Sif held Loki’s jaw so he was looking dead in her eyes, she mouthed ‘yours’ and kissed him soundly, letting go of his jaw.

“We were discussing ice cream,” Hela said.

“We’re going to get it!” Ashes stated.

“We certainly are now,” Hela muttered.

“You can hold your nephew,” Sif said, passing Ullr over to Hela, who began coughing when Ullr began clapping, somehow having secreted talc somewhere for this later use. “*Now* we can go for ice cream.”

"Did you really forget Heimdall knows the word 'ice cream' even without sound?" Loki asked the plotters.

"I knew Uncle Heimdall would bring everybody," Ashes said. "I thought he would wait til we got down to the ice cream buffet first though."

_Good save._

"On that note, good brother," Sif said to ever-watching and completely not present (yet) Heimdall - who bifrosted everyone down to Midgard, himself included ( _this is ice cream, after all_ )

"He-la he-la," Ullr sang, occasionally punctuating it with touching one finger to Hela's nose.

Meanwhile, “Mommy?” Ashes asked.

“Yes?” Sif asked.

“I asked Grandmother, and she said I had to ask you.”

 _There are very few things which Frigga will defer._ “What would you like to ask me?”

“Can I light the Firenight this year?”

“I think you’re responsible enough to do that,” Sif said. _The Avengers were curious about our childrens’ names, thinking Ullr was the odd one out…til he informed them his name meant kindling. Still they were curious, til I informed them that my name meant torch…which got Stephen and Scott discussing a Diogenes and his lamp searching for an honest soul…which made Loki insufferable for the rest of the evening._

Soon enough, the entire family arrived at the ice cream buffet. The waitress who met them at the entrance said to Ashes and Smoke, "You're in luck, your grandparents've only been waiting at your table for five minutes."

"Grandmother! Grandfather! Ice cream!" the kids shouted gladly.


End file.
